Leveraging Language Nuances

January 1, 2020 //
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Hello and Happy New Year! I wish you a simply stellar 2020. I wonder if they had as much fun with the year 1010 as we will have this year.

This very day, the 1st of January, reminds me of an example as to why marketing is always leveraging the nuances of language in its work.

Here’s my example. This is the eighth year that I’ve blogged. Sounds a lot, doesn’t it? Eight years! Except it isn’t really. It’s not that I’ve been blogging for eight years. It’s not even that I’m into my eighth year of blogging. Let me explain.

I started blogging in 2013. Fairly late in 2013, September in fact, but September nonetheless. Counting up the years – 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020 – this is indeed the eighth year that I’ve blogged. At least one post in each of those years, and if you exclude 2013 and 2020 I’ve blogged 156 times in each of them.

In reality the elapsed time is exactly six and a third years, or six and one third as our US friends would say, but eight years, or the eighth year, sounds much more impressive.

Trading on these nuances is what helps us marketers stretch our claims to our advantage, but not to breaking point.

It would take some going to get into my eighth year of blogging, and what seems like an eternity to have been doing it for eight whole years. Not gonna happen, don’t think.

 

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Categories Communication, Customers, Language, Marketing

Gemütlichkeit

December 30, 2019 //
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The Germans have a word, actually I’m sure they have several other such examples, that conveys something that’s really hard to express in English without using a far less economical explanation.

Wikipedia describes the word as ‘a state or feeling of warmth, friendliness, and good cheer. Other qualities encompassed by the term include coziness, peace of mind, and a sense of belonging and well-being springing from social acceptance.’

Whenever I think of the word I imagine being in a warm chalet half-way up a ski slope, with a roaring fire, comfy chairs, a bunch of friends and family, and a glass of gluhwein or a bowl of gulaschsuppe with a hunk of bread. I don’t ski very often at all, but I hope I’m conveying that feeling of snugness, without I hope, the feeling of smugness, that we can all experience without going alpine.

One of the wonders of there being loads of different languages is that they all have certain words relating to their own culture and are so idiomatic that you need a paragraph or even a book to do them justice in your own tongue. Another example would be the Danish word hygge, which is surprisingly close to gemütlichkeit in its meaning.

Whatever your own preference of word, I wish you much of it.

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Categories Communication, General, Language

C’est La Vie

December 27, 2019 //
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C’est la vie – this is the life! Or, as my good lady’s aunt pronounces it, ‘sest lav eye’.

What better phrase is there to sum up the pinnacle of being alive in a great moment? When you’re lying down with the sun on your face, or admiring an amazing view from the comfort of a chair, or enjoying a drink with friends in a place with gemütlichkeit, it’s those precious times when you are conscious of how lucky you are.

I wrote recently about the importance of enjoyment, and making an effort to enjoy whatever it is you’re doing. The self-help best seller and blogger Tim Ferriss also alluded to it in his 5-bullet Friday email when he picked for his ‘quote I’m pondering’ a Kurt Vonnegut line from the book A Man without a Country:

‘And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.’

Which, I guess you could say, is the exact North American translation of c’est la vie.

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Categories Communication, General

Christmas Trees

December 25, 2019 //
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You can’t beat a lovely looking natural Christmas tree.

These days, the argument over natural or artificial is an environmental one. The natural brigade point to the difficulties of disposing of an non-recyclable artificial tree. The artificial aficionados argue that their version lasts for years and years without having to uproot a tree every single year, and clear up after it as well.

As long as you’re buying from a source that is self-sustaining, natural Christmas trees win hands down for me. We get ours from Galway Christmas Trees, and I love the whole ritual of arguing over which one is the best, before we settle on our favourite, get it netted up and bring it home.

Not only is the natural look more welcoming, but the smell of it is great too. It’s like having a bit of forest in your own home. And, if you buy one that comes with a root ball, you can plant it afterwards and watch it grow – winner!

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Categories Customers, General

Judging a Book By Its Cover

December 23, 2019 //
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The phrase ‘to judge a book by it cover’ is a common one, and I’ve blogged before about how we should judge products by how good the accessories are, since they’re an intrinsic part of the product itself and the overall product experience.

I’m a firm believer in that you can judge a lot about a public place from the standard and cleanliness of its toilets. This is especially true of restaurants. If the toilets are not clean, what does that lead us to conclude about the restaurants’ approach to hygiene and about the kitchen in particular? Toilets are part of the product, the brand, the whole experience.

You can say exactly the same about pubs. I was out on a mini pub crawl the other evening. It was out in the country; we’re talking the deepest, darkest, quietest, most rural parts of east county Galway. Almost literally, the middle of nowhere. Some pubs you’d walk into, everyone would turn and look at you, and the decor was basic at best, very rough and ready.

The one pub that sticks in my mind? The one with the nice decor, the pleasant ambience, and, I have to say, the nicest toilets I have ever seen for a pub. Super clean, well appointed and with a recently applied expensive-looking tiling.

The pub that sticks in my mind is the one I will visit again. It got the whole product experience right, possibly without consciously trying to do, but by making an effort.

 

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Categories Communication, Customers, Marketing, Strategy

Enjoy

December 20, 2019 //
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How to live a long healthy life, stimulated in both work and play, with a loving family and trustworthy, supportive friends?

I was watching this video recently from BBC Reel about a certain region of Japan where they believe they’ve found the 4 secrets to long life. It’s probably no surprise that the world’s longest living nation puts its longevity down to diet, exercise, the ability to help yourself and a mutual help system, otherwise known as a socialising – at least in my book.

Speaking of my book, what do I think the secret of a long healthy life is? I’m barely half way to the age of Japan’s famed centenarians, so I’m hardly an infallible data point. But anyway, I think the secret is to enjoy. Enjoy who you are, what you’re doing, and the company of those you hold dear.

The enjoying who you are bit I think is the most important element. Being comfortable with who you are, what you do well, what you do less well, what you like and what you don’t like. A key part of being comfortable with who you are is being easy on yourself. Give yourself a break. Being down on yourself is almost always counter-productive.

That’s why I always try to have a one word parting gesture when someone’s about to embark on something they’re looking forward to, and, if I’m honest, on something they’re not looking forward to: enjoy.

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Categories General

Reality is Not Real

December 18, 2019 //
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I’ve always detested the so-called Reality TV genre. Really can’t abide it at all. It doesn’t matter what topic: celebrities, regular folks, dancing, surviving, loving, hating, watching reality TV. I find it awful and depressing.

I think this is because reality is not real. At least, reality television isn’t real. It’s an edited down, souped up, hammed up, extreme version of real life. All the good bits, the dramatic bits, put together for our entertainment. Packaged up as real, but not really real at all; simply entertainment, of a type.

It doesn’t convey real life, and I don’t think it was ever meant to. Real life is running all the time, and has always run, and you simply can’t convey the huge periods periods of not much happening, periods of normalcy, not even with vlogging. Normalcy is not viewable as entertainment, not even if you attempted some Truman Show-type of constant coverage. If you did you’d get the view the camera gives you, not your view, the individual’s.

When I was much younger, well before reality TV emerged, I sometimes day-dreamed about what it would be like televising me driving on a long journey, exploring my musings and regaling myself and my unseen audience with my wit. How would that ever be interesting to others, even if you had the most charismatic person in the world, unless you presented the highlights?

You can’t ever replicate the individual’s perspective of the reality they see and experience. Maybe there’s a different format yet to be explored which will do justice to real life. But probably not.

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Categories Communication, General

Good News

December 16, 2019 //
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The media’s obsession with bad news, or sensational news, means that it’s really hard to maintain a positive outlook and a sense of balance. This is because someone else is deciding which bits of the millions of bits happening in the world are worthy of making it through the funnel into the wider world.

Unfortunately, bad news, at least someone else’s bad news, sells rather well. Natural disasters, accidents, terrorism, politics; there’s not much uplifting in that lot.

My good lady sent me this great feature the other day, which I feel we all need. It’s from Bored Panda and the title says it all: I’m Honestly Fed Up With All The Bad News, So I Illustrated 50 Of The Best Ones From 2019.

The illustrations are in a style I love and each good news story is a great one that should go viral. It’s a serious antidote to all the FUD that threatens to cloud our view of the world. I’m not sure why good news is unfashionable, but it has been so for a while.

It’s really hard to pick a favourite, both in terms of illustration and news story; they’re all superb.

 

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Categories Communication, Customers, Marketing

Have Lots

December 13, 2019 //
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I used to think they’re were two groups in society, the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’. It turns out there’s a third group.

I didn’t realise this, and I never heard the phrase before. There are the haves, the have nots and the have lots.

The have lots have loads of money, and can pretty much stay in a hotel any night they wish, and any hotel too. They can pretty well do what they want. So can we all, I might argue, but there’s always a fairly large ‘within reason’ hanging around. Money stops the vast majority of us doing literally anything.

Now obviously there are tiers within tiers, and not all the have lots can buy a Premier League football club. But, it must be a funny feeling if you can do what you want, without compromise. How do you choose? Does it make choosing more difficult?

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Categories Customers, General

In Praise of the Dishwasher

December 11, 2019 //
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I like reading interviews with well known people when they’re asked the question: what is the best invention ever?

For me, the greatest invention of all time, as far as it impacts on my daily life, is the dishwasher. It’s a massive time-saver, time spent on that most tedious of chores.

I’m reminded of this every time my mother hosts a dinner in her apartment, because she doesn’t have one of these magical appliances. My mother would not be shy in using implements in the creation of one of her masterpieces. It’s not unheard of for one of her boys to come from the washing up into the living room to say: Look Mum, I found something in the kitchen you didn’t use!

I’ve briefly touched on the satisfaction of using this appliance before. You stack your dirty stuff, throw in a tab, set the program and close that sucker up. Return a couple of hours later and it’s all done, ready for you or an offspring to load the shelves and cupboards. You can also get cute and stack your dirty things in a way that makes it easier to put the clean stuff back. Awesome.

I realise that this is not the most earth-shattering or uplifting answer to the best invention question, but for me it’s one I’m thankful for every single day. Now if they could figure out a machine that will allow you to wash everything…

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Categories Customers, General
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